First, make sure you have support for the airport card compiled into the kernel, or compiled as a module and loaded. Changing the wireless settings is accomplished using iwconfig. This is part of the wireless-tools package.

As an example of using iwconfig, to set your SSID to home_ssid:

Code Listing 2.4: Setting an SSID

Code:

# iwconfig wlan0 essid home_ssid

Where wlan0 is your wifi card's device name. For Airport users, the wifi device is often eth1. For more details on iwconfig, refer to its man page.

The ESSID is the wireless name of the network you'd like to connect to, for instance, if you're connecting to an access point with ESSID "Linksys" with your Airport card, you'd put:

Code:

iwconfig eth1 essid Linksys

If you leave it blank, it should connect to an AP that's broadcasting its ESSID. Once you've connected to a network, you can use the wireless net device just like a regular ethernet card. You'll want to start dhcp if needed and any other required net services that you use.

The reason why the FAQ doesn't go more into detail is that using the Airport card is exactly the same as using a different wireless device and other FAQs cover the subject more in depth.